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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29743401">Adventures in Academia</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicalStardust/pseuds/MagicalStardust'>MagicalStardust</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>My HDM Works [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>His Dark Materials (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>...., F/F, Gen, Happy Birthday Jasper!!!!, In this house we love and support Oz and give him all the affection, Maryisa fluff, Monkie is baby, all the undergrads postgrads and doctors would literally die for Oz, also i couldn't avoid the angst train, and the undergraduates who would kill to protect their floofy golden monkey, including the doctors who are very confused about the strange noises in their ceilings, ngl this is kinda crack at some points, so soft, they are soft, this story is from multiple perspectives, we STAN</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 21:40:21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>8,244</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29743401</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicalStardust/pseuds/MagicalStardust</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Fluff (and Angst) for Jasper's birthday.</p><p>The monkey having adventures interspersed with Maryisa being wonderful.</p><p>Or, in other words, the story of how Oz becomes a permanent fixture at St. Peter's College, the small, fluffy monkey who everyone would happily die for, as told through the medium of fluff, angst and, honestly, crack.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Marisa Coulter &amp; Marisa Coulter's Daemon, Marisa Coulter's Daemon &amp; the physicists of St Peter's College Oxford, Marisa Coulter/Mary Malone, Mary Malone &amp; Marisa Coulter's Daemon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>My HDM Works [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2164986</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Adventures in Academia</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrusbuds/gifts">citrusbuds</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Firstly, Happy Birthday Jasper/Citrusbuds!!</p><p>Secondly, my undying thanks to Rhaized for reading through my first draft and adding her comments and suggestions. It wasn't a bad story before (admittedly, I thought it was, but that was the self-doubt), but her feedback definitely helped to turn this story into something I am pleased with and can be proud of (and that I am happy to gift to Jasper!).</p><p>I hope you all enjoy this (especially you, Jasper). I loved writing Oz, and maryisa, and all the academics and undergraduates!</p><p>03/03/21</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Five academics sat huddled around the table, gazing at each other seriously over their coffees.</p><p>Well, four of them were. Dr Oliver Payne was looking at the others in befuddlement. He was dimly aware of the noise in the cafeteria surrounding him, but all he could focus on was his colleagues and their grim expressions.</p><p>“What, exactly, have you brought me here to discuss?”</p><p>Dr Bradley looked at him sternly and clasped his hands together. “Oliver.”</p><p>“Yes?”</p><p>“You and Mary are quite good friends, yes?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“You spend a lot of time in her office?”</p><p>“Yes?”</p><p>To say that Oliver was a fan of where this conversation seemed to be going would have been a bold-faced lie.</p><p>“Well, we were wondering if you might be able to put to rest a little debate we’ve been having.”</p><p>“Okay,” Oliver said nervously. He did <em> not </em> want to be a part of inter-department rivalries. He did not want to be a part of whatever they were doing against Mary. What were they planning on doing? Gathering evidence against her so they could oust her from her position?</p><p>“What is making the funny noises coming from Marisa and Mary’s desk drawers?”</p><p>The other three academics leaned forward in anticipation, jaws set, eyes a mixture of hope and fear. One of them started drumming his fingers nervously on the table.</p><p>“What?” Oliver asked, before promptly bursting into laughter. “You want to… you want to know what lives in their desk drawers?”</p><p>“Ha!” Dr Sy said. “So it <em> is </em> something alive.”</p><p>“He didn’t <em> exactly </em>say that,” Dr Reid argued.</p><p>“So?” Dr Bradley pressed.</p><p>Oliver snorted. “I don’t know. And good luck finding out. I’ve been trying for about a month. The <em> only time </em>I actually managed to search through the drawers there was nothing there apart from a few old blankets… though I did notice some strange clanking noises coming from the ventilation systems, so I think whatever it was was hiding up there...”</p><p>“You know…” Dr Bradley said pensievely, “I’ve heard some strange noises coming from the ceiling in the last few months or so. Sort of a bum-bumf bum-bumf bum-bumf. I’d convinced myself that it was just the pipes, but… what if it is something…”</p><p>“So you subscribe to the school of thought that it is something alive, then,” Amber Whittaker (very nearly PhD) asked.</p><p>“Probably… doesn’t mean that it is something <em> natural </em> though…” Oliver shuddered.</p><p>“I just wish they’d tell us,” Dr Sy moaned. “If enough of us banded together maybe we could get the ‘no pets at work’ rule overturned. I want to bring Cheddar to work.”</p><p>“But, unlike Cheddar, it doesn’t smell, it doesn’t leave any traces,” Dr Reid pointed out. Dr Sy glared at him. “And Mary is not the kind of person to keep an animal locked in a drawer, nor to let it crawl around in the ceiling. Marisa… now, <em> she </em>might be that cruel. But, she’s not the type to do anything that would call for disciplinary action and damage her chances of getting her PhD. You know how serious about it she is.”</p><p>“All too well,” Amber sighed.</p><p>“Are you <em> sure </em> you don’t know what is making the noises?” Dr Bradley fixed Oliver with a hard stare, his eyes boring into Oliver’s own. Oliver shifted uncomfortably and looked towards the other academics, their eager and suspicious gazes scrutinising him.</p><p>He sighed. “Yes, Andrew, I am sure.”</p><p>“Hmmm,” Dr Bradley studied him for a moment. “In which case, would you like to take part in our betting pool? The closest to the truth wins. The losers each have to buy the winner a drink at next month’s conference.”</p><p>“Well… I wouldn’t consider myself a gambling man, but… sure, what’s the harm!” Oliver grinned. Sure, this situation was bizarre, but he appreciated this turn of events, you couldn’t say that it wasn’t interesting.</p><p>Far less anxious than he had been at the start of this interrogation, he stared off into the distance and rummaged through his imagination.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Oz padded through the dusty space between the ceiling tiles and the floor above, ducking under a hot water pipe and scrabbling over some flexible aluminium ducting.</p><p>He was <em> bored </em>.</p><p>He felt the pull of Marisa, she was currently in a lab on the other side of the building, but it wasn’t too difficult to ignore it. Being this far away didn’t hurt, not anymore. Now it was merely uncomfortable.</p><p>He continued his explorations until he caught the rise and fall of a voice, excitable and melodic. It was muffled by distance, building materials, and the other clatterings of everyday life in a university, but it got steadily clearer as he continued onwards.</p><p>Mary!</p><p>Chittering excitedly, he tried to find where her voice was coming from. He had to scramble about a bit, investigating the walls, looking for any loose tiles; sometimes her voice was clearer, sometimes fainter. It took five minutes, but he eventually managed to find a place at the edge, where the ceiling met the wall, where there was a little drop down to allow the air vents at the top of the wall to breathe into the cavity above them.</p><p>He dropped into the little space and stared through the grating.</p><p>There she was! In front of the class! Her messy curls (the same colour as his fur!) bobbing from left to right as she animatedly discussed the topic of the lecture. Bright diagrams stood on the whiteboard behind her, and she had a line of green marker across her left cheek.</p><p>The Monkey smiled.</p><p>Mary.</p><p>Mary was kind. Mary was safe. Mary gave him lots of cuddles.</p><p>And with that thought, he snuggled down in his little hiding place, perfectly content as he listened to the soft voice of his most favourite person. Her words, vivid explanations of complicated equations, of dark matter, calmed him, lulled him, and, utterly at peace, he slipped quietly into a doze.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>The door to her office opened and Mary glanced up from her computer to see Marisa standing in the doorway, looking thoroughly discombobulated with her puzzled eyes and several strands of hair escaping from her tight bun; they were frizzing slightly, as if she’d been tugging at them.</p><p>Well, to anyone else Marisa would have appeared mildly flustered, but Mary thought that she’d become pretty adept at reading her girlfriend in the time they’d been together.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” Mary asked, biting her lip.</p><p>“Nothing, nothing’s wrong,” Marisa said a little vaguely, shaking her head slightly, as if trying to make sense of something. She closed the door behind her and then made her way over to her desk (aka, the desk that she had appropriated from Mary). It was very obvious whose desk was whose. Marisa’s was perfectly organised, not even her pens deviated from their assigned position. Mary’s looked like a bomb had hit it. Accordingly, she rarely found the coffee stained paper she was looking for when she needed it.</p><p>Marisa sat down heavily in her chair and frowned at the bookcase opposite, like she did when she was trying to solve a particularly complex equation.</p><p>“How did the feedback on your first assignment go?” Mary asked. It was probably better to get to the point here instead of leaving Marisa to brood. She passed Marisa her mug of coffee and she took it absently, taking a long swig, eyes still fixed on the books.</p><p>Her girlfriend had been horrific all morning, storming round the house, glaring at everything, and when she’d left their office to see her supervisor the casual observer would have thought she was going off to war. That, or execution.</p><p>“Fine,” Marisa said, seemingly stunned. “Dr Bradley… praised my work.”</p><p>“I said he would,” Mary pointed out, raising her eyebrows. “Do you trust me more now?”</p><p>“I… I didn’t even have to fight for it…” Marisa shook her head. “And he read <em> everything </em>through. He wrote little comments on the side saying what he liked, he offered suggestions about what other research I could read and link my work to. We just spent the last twenty minutes discussing the ramifications of my work on our understanding of physics.”</p><p>She grinned, and then laughed, like she couldn’t believe the reality she had found herself in.</p><p>“This is it, this is what being a scholar in your world is like, <em> Dr </em> Malone,” she looked at Mary then, her face raw with emotion, and Mary wondered how close she was to crying. “It’s wonderful… thank you, for letting me stay.”</p><p>Mary wheeled her chair around her desk to bring her closer to Marisa. “I assure you,” she smirked. “My reasons were quite selfish.”</p><p>“No,” Marisa said, shaking her head and smiling affectionately at the other woman. “Nothing about you is selfish, Mary Malone.” </p><p>And with that they closed the gap between them. Mary’s lips found Marisa’s, her palm rested on the side of Marisa’s face, Marisa’s hands tangled in her messy curls.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Things started to escalate for Oz a few weeks later. He was sitting in the shadows at the back of the lecture hall, hidden under the seats, when some feet appeared to his right and a heavy bumph indicated that someone had sat down in the next seat. Oz was surprised, the lecture had started 10 minutes ago, and most people liked to sit nearer the front so they could interact with Mary better. Oz guessed that this person had been late; they must have snuck in through the back doors. Though why anyone would want to be late to Mary’s lectures he wasn’t sure.</p><p>Several minutes later the calm of Mary’s voice and the scratching of pens was interrupted by a blur of movement and a sharp clatter in front of him. Oz scrambled back on autopilot, cowering and pressing himself into the level behind him. His heart beating in his ears, he opened his eyes a crack to see a hand scrabbling around on the floor in front of him. A whimper caught in his throat. Then he noticed a black biro on the ground, barely ten centimetres from him.</p><p>If he could have allowed himself to make a sound he would have laughed in relief. He was so stupid, reacting like that to a pen. Instead, he inched forwards and batted the pen towards the searching hand. It rolled slowly into the person’s fingers and the appendages froze suddenly, before grasping the pen between them and lifting it cautiously up off the ground.</p><p>Oz allowed himself to relax slightly. It was okay, he told himself, everything was fine. He was okay.</p><p>Then suddenly there came a swish of air from above him and two dark brown eyes were gazing into his. They widened as he sat there, paralysed, shaking, unable to pull air into his lungs. Then the eyes disappeared and he was staring at the back of the seats in front again.</p><p>He’d been seen.</p><p>He needed to run.</p><p>Needed to get out of there.</p><p>He wasn’t safe.</p><p>Both Marisa and Mary had made it very clear that no one in the university was allowed to see him.</p><p>But he couldn’t move, not even an inch.</p><p>Then the hand extended again. It was holding something shiny.</p><p>Oz tilted his head. It looked like one of the wrapped toffees Mary and Marisa liked to eat.</p><p>Was it for him?</p><p>The hand didn’t retract and so the daemon inched forwards towards the offering.</p><p>Could it be a trap?</p><p>Dare he risk it?</p><p>On impulse his soft paw shot out and snatched up the sweet in the shiny blue wrapping, before darting back against the step again.</p><p>Nothing bad seemed to happen because of it.</p><p>A few minutes later Oz felt safe enough to unwrap the toffee and cast it aside. Then he inspected the wrapping. It was shiny blue on the outside, and on the other side a silver that sparkled prettily in the few rays of light that managed to reach his hiding place. It made a pleasing soft crackling noise as he scrunched it and flattened it out, and scrunched it and flattened it out again. </p><p>Over the course of the next half hour the human offered him four more sweets, each with different coloured wrappings. Each time they did so Oz felt himself becoming more and more confident, less terrified of reaching out and accepting the gift.</p><p>After the lecture had ended and everyone had left, Oz made his way up into the ceiling again with his new treasures. He scampered along to the ceiling above Mary and Marisa’s office and found a suitable corner in which to keep his precious gifts safe. No one had ever given him anything nice before, no one except Mary (and Marisa, when she had been younger). Was this new person a friend, like Mary was?</p><p>Oz sincerely hoped so.</p><p>And with that, he settled down on top of the crinkling sweet wrappers like a dragon guarding its hoard.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Mary said, giving Marisa a light peck on the lips before slipping onto the chair opposite her. “The meeting took <em>forever</em>, then I ran into one of my former students, she’s got a teaching position at Nottingham now, and seems to be doing some interesting research.”</p><p>“It’s fine,” Marisa said easily. Though she was usually one who valued punctuality and didn’t like to be kept waiting, she had been engrossed in her research into particle physics. Besides, she could forgive Mary a lot of things she wouldn’t tolerate from other people, for some reason doing so never seemed difficult. “Your tea has probably gone cold, though.”</p><p>Mary picked up the mug and gave it an experimental sip. She scrunched up her face in thought. Marisa wondered if Mary knew how adorable she was when she did that. “It’s still decent cold,” she decided.</p><p>“How did the faculty meeting go?” Marisa asked, sipping the second coffee she’d bought since she’d arrived at the coffee shop. She’d gone for a gingerbread latte this time. There was something about the faint spices, the odd sweetness of the syrup, that went so well with the bitterness of coffee.</p><p>“Horrifically,” Mary said, before taking a bite of the millionaire shortbread that Marisa had got for her. She chomped on it moodily and had barely finished her mouthful when she continued, “Frankly, there are points where I wonder what I’m doing in academia. You should give up now, before you’re a full member of some faculty, these meetings will drain the life out of you, I swear.” She took another angry bite out of the shortbread.</p><p>Marisa rolled her eyes affectionately. “I know you don’t mean that.”</p><p>“No, but I just needed the rant,” Mary replied, her mouth still half full. “D’you want to just chill here for the rest of the afternoon? I don’t want to do more work today.”</p><p>Marisa considered this. “I think that is an excellent proposition.”</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>“I’m telling you, there was a monkey there, under my seat. I fed him toffees.”</p><p>“Sure, Aled, sure,” Zainab replied, rolling her eyes.</p><p>“I’m telling the truth!” Aled protested hotly, rather hurt by the injustice of her words.</p><p>“Yeah, and how high were you at the time?” Tamsin asked, smirking.</p><p>“I was not high, I was hungover.” He shifted uncomfortably as he felt the sceptical gazes of the other two eating away at him. “Okay, maybe I <em>was</em> still slightly high at the time… but please just sit back there with me. I’ll prove it to you.”</p><p>“Fine,” Zainab sighed. “If it will get you to shut up about it.”</p><p>“I’m not sure about sitting so far away from Mary. What if she thinks we don’t like her?”</p><p>“Tamsin, you sit at the very back in<em> every single other lecture </em>.”</p><p>“Yeah,” Tamsin agreed. “But Mary isn’t the lecturer for those ones.”</p><p>Just then the door to the lecture hall opened and Mary’s head popped out. </p><p>“Hi everyone,” she said cheerily before stepping back inside so everyone could enter. Aled didn’t think he’d ever seen her anything less than bright and bubbly before, not even at 9am - that was probably why everyone liked her so much. That and the fact that she was genuinely a really good lecturer.</p><p>The class began filing in and the three of them greeted Mary with grins and waves as they passed the desk at the front of the room. Mary smiled back sunnily.</p><p>Aled bounded up the steps until he found the level he’d been on last week. He shuffled down the row to give enough space for the girls to join him.</p><p>“Next week we are going back to the front,” Tamsin muttered.</p><p>Zainab snorted. “Please, just because you’re thirsting over her.”</p><p>“I am <em> not </em>,” Tamsin protested. “I’ll have you know there is no one I ship more than her and her girlfriend.”</p><p>“She has a girlfriend?” Aled’s eyes widened. Like, sure Mary gave off that kind of energy, but having it confirmed was something else.</p><p>“Oh yeah,” Tamsin nodded. “I don’t know her name, but she’s tall, got dark hair, kinda intense, ‘get out of my way or I’ll stab you’ vibes. She’s doing her masters or her doctorate, I think. I saw them kissing in the coffee shop across the way.”</p><p>“Wait, isn’t that a bit weird?” Zainab asked, suddenly looking quite uncomfortable. “I mean, if she’s dating one of her students…”</p><p>“Nah, she’s in her mid-thirties I think,” Tamsin shrugged. “Mature student rather than a twenty three year old or something.”</p><p>“And you want <em> her </em> to step on you <em> too </em>,” Aled cough-hissed, only to receive a sharp elbow in the ribs from Tamsin. “Okay. I deserved that.”</p><p>At that moment Mary called for the beginning of class and they had to end their discussion there. But Aled was ready. He reached his hand into the pocket of his hoody and pulled out a toffee. With his right hand taking notes, he let his left hang down below the seat, the offering to his monkey pal in his hand.</p><p>When five minutes had passed and there had been no soft brush of fur across his palm, Zainab was struggling not to laugh. He kept seeing her glancing in his direction, she wasn't even bothering to hide her smirks. Tamsin was paying no attention to either of them, too enraptured in Dr Mary Malone.</p><p>But then, just as he was about to give up, he heard a scuffling below the seats, and a small hand snatched the sweet out of his palm.</p><p>He grinned, and waved his empty palm at the girls. Zainab frowned. Tamsin studiously ignored him.</p><p>Now for phase two. Upon contemplation over the previous week he had given a great deal of thought to a monkey’s ideal diet. He took a banana from his rucksack and offered it to the animal underneath his seat.</p><p>The banana was taken from him.</p><p>Mission accomplished.</p><p>A few simple equations later and he felt something tapping his leg gently. He looked down to see a golden paw nudging his leg with a half peeled banana. </p><p>He elbowed Tamsin a few times before she grudgingly paid attention to him, and he pointed down to the paw proffering the banana. Her eyes widened and she nudged Zainab. “What the hell?” she mouthed, staring down at his half hidden paw and the wavering banana.</p><p>“I think he wants you to take it,” Tamsin whispered, barely audible, clearly doing her best to not do anything that would make Mary think less of her.</p><p>“But… I gave it to him?”</p><p>“And, he’s been helpful and peeled your banana for you, take it, don’t hurt his feelings!” she replied through gritted teeth, staring straight down at Mary, who was describing the basics of dark matter (something which the scientist frequently referred to as 'dust').</p><p>Awkwardly, Aled took the banana back and began munching on it. He hoped Mary wouldn’t mind. Technically, it was university policy that they couldn’t eat in lectures.</p><p>There came a clatter from beside him as Zainab knocked her exercise book to the floor. She spent too long bent double with her head underneath the seat for that to have been an accident, and when she had composed herself she wrote very neatly in her exercise book; <em> It’s </em> actually <em> a golden monkey </em>.</p><p><em> Told you, </em> Aled wrote in his, <em> I told you it wasn’t the drugs. </em></p><p> </p><p>Oz was having a very good day.</p><p>Not only had he received six more sweet wrappers from the two people on the left, and several doodles from the person in the sparkly headscarf on the right, but he had been able to help his new friend by peeling his banana for him.</p><p>Happily, he scampered back to his hiding place to add his new gifts to his treasure trove.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Marisa took a sip of her drink and relaxed as she gazed at her girlfriend. Around them buzzed the voices of the other academics, catching up before the beginning of the conference. If things went well, as Mary had assured her they would, this should be a very nice weekend. She would be just making contacts (like a normal person would, it wasn’t a power struggle here) and listening to others presenting their research.</p><p>Mary frowned as she looked at something just past Marisa’s shoulder. Her gaze lingered there for a second before her eyes dropped down into her drink.</p><p>“What’s wrong?”</p><p>Mary shook her head. “It’s strange,” she said. “Don’t look behind now, but they keep looking at us. I think they’re talking about us.”</p><p>Marisa clenched her jaw, she was used to people talking about her, so used to it, but it didn’t mean she had to like it, it didn’t mean it didn’t make her uncomfortable. “Who?” she asked, forcing herself to do as Mary had instructed and not look behind her.</p><p>“Oliver, Andrew Bradley, Amber Whittaker, Khady Sy, Loïc Reid, and oh, a couple of others are going to join them now. Damnit, I think Khady just caught me watching them.”</p><p>Mary blushed and Marisa managed to resist the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose.</p><p>Mary gazed worriedly into her drink. “I wonder what it is about us that they’re talking about.”</p><p>“It could be anything,” Marisa said, trying her best to suppress her emotions. It didn’t matter what people thought of them, what they would try to throw at them. They would overcome it. “However... now I think about it, they have been having a lot of hushed conversations at the end of the corridor.”</p><p>Mary looked so nervous and crushed at these words and Marisa frantically searched for something to say that would make her feel better.</p><p>“Mary,” she said seriously, gazing into her eyes. “It doesn’t matter what they’re talking about, what they’re thinking of, it doesn’t matter, because we’re better than them. Whatever they throw at us we’ll fight it and we’ll beat it.”</p><p>“Well, I wouldn’t exactly say we’re better than them…”</p><p>“Mary!” Marisa snapped. “Now is not the time to be complimentary towards your colleagues.”</p><p>“It’s the time to stamp them into the dirt beneath our heels, is it?” Mary responded drily, one eyebrow raised.</p><p>“Precisely.”</p><p> </p><p>On the other side of the function room Oliver was trying to stare surreptitiously at Marisa’s bag.</p><p>“There, it moved,” he said triumphantly. “You saw that, yes? It moved. There’s something alive in there.”</p><p>“Yeah, I saw it,” Dr Bradley said.</p><p>“I still don’t think it has to be something alive,” Dr Reid argued. “It could be a robot.”</p><p>The others rolled their eyes.</p><p>“Give it up, Loïc.” Oliver shook his head.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>They were well into semester two now and Oz sat nestled between Aled and Zainab about halfway up the seating area. It was perhaps a little closer than he might have liked, but Mary hadn’t spotted that he’d been breaking the rules yet, so he didn't feel too unsafe there. Tamsin, the serious girl who wore flannels and hung onto every word Mary said, was sitting at the end. Ben and Riz, two of Aled’s close friends, sat on Aled’s other side.</p><p>The daemon allowed the warm feeling of happiness to settle over him as he sat in between his friends. He scribbled down lecture notes like the others did, in the little notebook that Tamsin had given him. He didn’t really need to write notes, what Mary was teaching was basic compared to what he’d been studying with Marisa over the last decade or so, but he liked being like his friends and sometimes there were new terms that were useful to know, or new theorems and ways of looking at things.</p><p>His friends had been shocked when he had started writing out complex equations - Aled had actually sworn in the middle of the lecture… and had then gone bright red and had had to awkwardly apologise to Mary. But, it wasn’t a bad kind of shock; no one got mad at him, no one hurt him. Aled had given him extra chocolate wrappers, and Zainab had given him a scritch behind the ear.</p><p>The only problem with this was that his friends had come to the conclusion that he had been the subject of an illicit science experiment somewhere in the university and had managed to escape, hence here he was, haunting the lecture halls. This had led to them attempting to ‘rescue’ him and take him away from the university, away from Marisa.</p><p>Oz had appreciated the sentiment, but he had escaped and the next lecture had handed them a very firm note stating that he liked being at the university and didn’t appreciate being kidnapped. Aled had then presented him with a very small backpack ‘borrowed’ from one of his sister’s toddlers and an old smartphone containing a whatsapp chat with all of them in it. Oz had strict instructions to call them if he ever did need rescuing.</p><p>Oz didn’t use the phone for anything except sending them photos of himself and funny views of the faculty members from the ceiling. The phone always stayed up in the ceiling space (except when he snuck down somewhere to borrow someone’s charger); he didn’t want Marisa or Mary to know that he’d been doing exactly what they’d warned him not to. However, every time he had lectures with his friends he scampered off to them with his backpack containing his small notebook, a few pens, and his phone.</p><p>He’d never been a part of anything like this before, never had his own friends (come to that he wasn’t actually sure if Marisa had had her own friends before coming to this world), and he revelled in it.</p><p>When the lecture was over Zainab opened her bag and gestured for him to hop inside. He looked at her sceptically. This was how they’d tried to kidnap him last time; he wasn’t that stupid.</p><p>She rolled her eyes. “We’re just getting coffee,” she said. “We thought you’d want to come with. It won’t be like last time, I promise.”</p><p>Oz shot her a ‘it better not be’ look before hopping inside. He wouldn’t say he liked travelling in bags, but he’d had enough experience of it with Marisa that it was everyday routine now.</p><p>One uncomfortable five minutes later and the bag he was in was deposited, relatively gently on a flat surface. The bag was unzipped and he popped his head out into the orange light of the café.</p><p>He couldn’t see much of the café from where he was, so it looked like he would be safe enough there. He hopped out onto the battered sofa and smiled up at Zainab.</p><p>She grinned back. “The others are getting their drinks, do you want anything?”</p><p>Oz shook his head. None of them seemed to be able to accept the idea that he didn’t need to eat or drink anything. He hoped the message would get through to them eventually.</p><p>“Okay then,” she rolled her eyes at him good-naturedly before shaking her head at someone across the room. “What have you been working on?” she asked.</p><p>Oz hesitated for only a second before opening his little rucksack and digging his notebook out. He flicked through it until he’d found his latest drawing - there he was, in bright orange felt tip in the middle of the page, surrounded by Aled, Tamsin, Zainab, Riz and Ben. They all wore bright smiles. He was a little nervous about showing it to her - it was definitely some of his best work, and he had improved so much since he had begun drawing earlier in the year, but there was still that slight bit of anxiety that she wouldn’t like it.</p><p>His fears, however, were quickly put to rest when Zainab grinned widely and drew him into a hug. “Awww, it’s so good! I feel so honoured! You should be so proud of yourself! Hey, Riz, Ben, come look at what Oz has drawn!”</p><p>There came a clattering of plates and cutlery from above and then their heads became visible over the top of the table.</p><p>“Oh, that’s really great Oz!” Riz said.</p><p>“Yeah, I really like the colours you’ve used,” Ben added.</p><p>Oz beamed with pride.</p><p>“Zainab indicated that you didn’t want anything but we got you some water anyway, we’re worried you don’t drink enough,” Ben said, learning over the table and putting a glass of water with a straw in it down besides Oz.</p><p>“Or eat enough,” Riz muttered.</p><p>Oz looked up at them with his big, mournful eyes. When were they going to understand that he just didn’t need to eat. He had even written it out for them: <em> DO NOT NEED FOOD OR WATER. NOT NORMAL MONKEY. </em> His friends had then come to the conclusion that he was ill. He had had to pretend he was eating elsewhere just to get Tamsin to stop fussing. Honestly, it was quite exhausting.</p><p>“Hey,” Aled’s voice came from above him, and then his head came into view too. Tamsin stood behind him, holding another tray.</p><p>“Look what Oz drew guys, isn’t it great!?” Zainab held up Oz’s picture for the other two to see.</p><p>“Yeah it really is!” Aled exclaimed, before plonking himself down on the other side of Oz and giving him a quick hug.</p><p>“Seriously, you have come on so much!” Tamsin stated.</p><p>Oz beamed.</p><p>They spent the next fifteen minutes chatting idly. Oz zoned out for a bit of it, having discovered that although he couldn’t drink the water, he could use the straw to blow bubbles into it. This was very fun and passed the time quite nicely.</p><p>Then they got on to coursework.</p><p>Oz took his time looking over Aled’s work and showing him how to correct it. He wouldn’t say that Aled was unintelligent exactly, apparently everyone who got into Oxford was very clever, but he couldn’t help thinking that Marisa could have done the work in her sleep at that age.</p><p>He had just moved on to checking through Zainab’s when, “What have you got there?”</p><p>Oz’s head shot up from the work to gaze into the eyes of Oliver, Marisa’s colleague, someone he had only ever seen from the ceiling or when peeping out from some other hiding place. And Oliver was staring straight at him.</p><p>All of this happened in a moment and the next thing he knew Aled had thrown himself on top of him.</p><p>“Iced coffee,” Oz heard Aled say, his voice slightly muffled as Oz’s ears were currently being squashed into the sofa cushions.</p><p>“Oz!”</p><p>It was at this point that Oz realised his tail was still sticking out from behind Aled’s back. Cautiously he poked his head out.</p><p>Mary was standing there, her eyes wide.</p><p>Oz’s mind shuddered with guilt and fear, he had disappointed Mary, he had broken her rules. She had liked him before, she had protected him. She would never do so again now.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Mary couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Oz, sitting there with her second year students, as if him being out in the open wasn’t putting both he and Marisa in extreme danger.</p><p>The monkey stared back at her, eyes wide and terrified, the way he used to look at Marisa, the way he occasionally still looked at Marisa, but not the way he tended to look at her. Before she could press down her alarm enough to really process this Aled had swept the monkey up into his arms and was glaring at her. Oz clung to him for dear life.</p><p>“You know him?” Aled demanded.</p><p>Mary blinked, trying to make sense of why they were trying to protect the daemon from her, she who would do anything to keep Oz safe, but she answered anyway. “Yes.”</p><p>“What have you all been doing to him!?” Tamsin demanded, a look of utter betrayal painted over her face.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>“He can do algebra, and advanced physics, and communicate with us. We know he’s been experimented on.”</p><p>Mary stared at them all, open mouthed, at a complete loss for words. It was at this point the information that her subconscious had been collecting clicked into place and she realised that Oliver had left her side and that everyone in the cafe was staring at them.</p><p>She looked at the faces of five of her most competent students. Well, five of her most competent students up until recently, that was. She couldn’t help but feel that they hadn’t been giving it their best in recent months, they had seemed far more distracted of late. That was why she and Oliver had gone over to speak to them in the coffee shop, she’d wanted to know if there was anything she could do to help them get back on track, to realise their potential. Instead, she had found this scene. They gazed back at her, eyes full of mistrust, betrayal, confusion. Oz had buried his head in Aled’s chest.</p><p>“Look,” she said. “I think we should go back to my office where we can discuss things properly.”</p><p>“No,” Zainab said. “We won’t let you hurt him.”</p><p>Mary didn’t succeed in resisting the urge to roll her eyes. “I’m not going to hurt him,” she stated. “I have never hurt him and I will never hurt him, but he’s not safe here, out in the open. If you want to protect him you’ll come with me.”</p><p>She saw their eyes flicker between each other, and then around at the café. They nodded at each other.</p><p>“Okay, we’ll come with you,” Aled agreed.</p><p>“Thank you,” she said, then held her hands out. “Come on, Oz.”</p><p>Oz curled up into an even tighter ball.</p><p>“He doesn’t have to if he doesn’t want to,” Aled said.</p><p>Mary was trying very, very hard not to be offended.</p><p>“Okay then,” she said, before rubbing her temples with her hand. “Let’s just go.”</p><p>What followed was an extremely nerve-wracking journey back to her office. She tried desperately not to think about how Oz wasn’t safe, how Marisa wasn’t safe, not trapped in the arms of some undergraduate, exposed to the questioning eyes of everyone they passed.</p><p>Dr Khady Sy came round a corner, gaped past Mary at where Aled clasped the shaking Oz, turned on her heel, and sprinted back the way she’d come. When Mary turned the corner she saw Khady disappearing round the next one.</p><p>She tried to pretend like Marisa and Oz’s lives (and hers) weren’t in danger of falling apart.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Marisa sat frozen at her desk, staring blankly at the article on her screen.</p><p>She swallowed, her mind at war between the decision to crush down the nearly overwhelming anxiety that Oz was radiating and to go and seek her daemon out, to check he was okay, to berate him for worrying her.</p><p>The door burst open without even a knock and Marisa found herself thrust out of her daze, her gaze landing on a Mary who looked pale with worry.</p><p>“What-”</p><p>Then other people filed into the room behind Mary and her eyes caught Oz, trapped in the arms of one of them.</p><p>Fear flared through her mind before being quickly overtaken with a hot, burning rage. She channeled every bit of threat and composure that she’d learnt from her world and got steadily to her feet.</p><p>“You are going to let him go, or you are going to regret it,” she told the wide-eyed male holding Oz. Immediately she found herself faced by the other four students, all scuffling to get themselves in front of Oz.</p><p>“We won’t let you hurt him!” The girl in the headscarf glared at her.</p><p>“Hurt him?” Marisa simpered. “My dear girl it is yourself you should be worried about. I-”</p><p>“Marisa,” Mary broke in. Marisa raised an eyebrow at her. “They seem to think we’ve been experimenting on a normal monkey. I do think they are actually trying to protect Oz.”</p><p>Marisa blinked, trying to process this information. That didn’t sound right, that didn’t sound right at all. However, she decided that the best strategy should be to take this at face value for the moment, act like she believed in it. She turned back to the group. “If you want him to be safe, then I suggest you give him back.”</p><p>“If he’s safe with you then why is he scared of you?” the girl in the checked shirt asked.</p><p>Marisa gritted her teeth. “Oz,” she said. “Stop being so ridiculous and come here, I won’t hurt you, you know I’ve not done so for two months now. Or if you won’t go to me then at least go to Mary, she’s never hurt you, has she?” She couldn’t see him through the students but she sincerely hoped he was listening.</p><p>“The very fact that you <em> used </em>to hurt him is setting off alarm bells,” headscarf-girl snapped. “Aled, don’t you dare give him to them.”</p><p>The fact that the university had very strict policies on strangling students (according to Mary) was the only thing holding Marisa back at this point. </p><p>“Look, guys,” Mary pleaded. “Marisa really isn’t going to hurt him. They’ve been with each other their whole lives and they’ve been through some awful things, okay-”</p><p>“Mary!”</p><p>“- but they’re in a fairly good place now, so really…”</p><p>Oliver, Mary’s vaguely annoying research partner, had appeared in the doorway, slightly out of breath, some of the others from the physics department hot on his heels.</p><p>Marisa took the feeling that she was trapped, squashed it down, and allowed anger to wash over it.</p><p>“What’s been in the ceiling, is that monkey,” he said, pointing in between the students, flushed with excitement and triumph. “It <em> has </em>to be.”</p><p>“Just because there is suddenly a monkey, doesn’t mean-”</p><p>Marisa snarled, but found herself unable to speak - the monkey’s terror was almost impossible to ignore now.</p><p>“We’re not giving him to you either!” the student holding the monkey yelled. “None of you are getting your hands on him.”</p><p>“We don’t care what you do to us, we won’t let you experiment on animals,” the student on the right said simply.</p><p>“Riz. What are you talking about?” Dr Bradley asked. “We’re physicists, not biologists.”</p><p>“Listen,” Mary all but shouted as Marisa desperately tried to retain her composure. “No-one is experimenting on Oz, this has all been a misunderstanding. And what on earth are you on about Oliver?”</p><p>Oliver looked slightly abashed. “Well, we have a bet, you see. A bet on what’s been in your desk drawer, and in the ceiling, and in Marisa’s handbag.”</p><p>Events suddenly clicked into place and Marisa exploded. “You let me think that you were all conspiring against Mary, trying to get her kicked out the department, and really, you were having an imbecilic bet on what Oz was!?”</p><p>“Yes?”</p><p>“What the hell, Oliver!?” Mary yelled before Marisa had managed to get over her anger enough to speak.</p><p>Oliver cringed. “I wasn’t the one who started it!”</p><p>Her colleagues looked at each other awkwardly, and, that was <em> it, </em>Marisa didn’t care about the rules, she was going to choke the life out of at least one of them. Oliver first.</p><p>She launched herself towards them, only to be hindered by Mary, who grasped her around her waist in an attempt to stop her progress.</p><p>“Get <em> off </em> me!” She threw Mary off and started forward again, then-</p><p>“What is the meaning of this!?”</p><p>Marisa froze, breathing heavily, glaring at the man who had just appeared in the doorway.</p><p>“For goodness sake, all of you! I thought I was the head of a department of physicists, not a primary school!”</p><p>Marisa stood up straighter and tried to regain her composure. Her emotions were spiralling wildly and he was fairly sure she was a mess, but, she had practice, she could work with this.</p><p>“Did <em>you</em> know about the experiments?” the checked shirt girl accused. Somewhere in the back of her mind Marisa thought you had to give the girl credit for keeping on at this.</p><p>“What experiments?” Dr Markus Samburg, the head of the physics department, demanded, running his hand desperately through his thinning grey hair. “Why are you- oh just give Oz back to Marisa.”</p><p>“You know about Oz?” the student holding her daemon demanded at the same time as her brainless colleagues started to protest.</p><p>“Of course I know about the monkey,” Dr Samburg said, clearly at his wits’ end. Marisa could relate. “Why do you think I’ve been rebutting all of security’s attempts to put rat-traps in the ceiling?”</p><p>The betting-pool academics looked extremely uncomfortable. <em> Good, </em> Marisa thought.</p><p>Then Dr Samburg turned to the group of students. “Now please give Oz back to Marisa. I don’t want a murder case on my hands.”</p><p>Aled loosened his grip slightly and the daemon slipped to the floor, and scampered over to Marisa, seeming to understand that he would be safest with her after all. He tried to hide behind her legs, as was his custom, but Marisa grabbed him and lifted him up into her arms. Ordinarily, she would never have done this, especially not back on her world. But every instinct was screaming at her that Oz was safest (they were both safest) if he was right there in her arms, as close to her as possible. She could feel his heartbeat through her shirt, and he seemed to be fairly humming with anxiety. For once, she wasn’t angry about his emotions, they were appropriate reactions to dealing with these half-wits. She gave him a few soft pats on the head to show him this. Through their bond she felt his anxiety start to calm slightly. That was good.</p><p>She scanned the faces of everyone in the room (or crowded outside it). She didn’t know how they were going to get through this, but that was fine. The only thing that mattered was that they would.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Later that evening Marisa and Mary lay snuggled in bed, their covers over them like a tent as they watched some mindless film on Mary’s tablet. Well, Mary had actually fallen asleep in front of it, and it would be fair to say that Marisa was only using it as background noise as she organised her thoughts. Oz lay in between them both, where he felt safe, and where they felt he was safe, that they could protect him. He was clutching his little teddy bear and dozing after the exhaustion of the day.</p><p>Marisa had tried to be mad at him, she had also tried not to be mad at him. She didn’t know how she felt, not exactly, but she knew that she couldn’t really blame him. He’d felt so bored, so trapped, so alone, hiding while they had happily worked on their physics projects. She would have done something reckless if it had been her.</p><p>(And Oz was a part of her, as Mary would frequently remind her).</p><p>It had taken quite a while to sort out the mess at the university, to convince Oz’s silly ‘friends’ that he was safe with her and Mary, to explain what had been going on.</p><p>It was Dr Samburg who had explained. Mary and Marisa had had to recount her life story to him when they had been trying to get her a place at the university. She had absolutely hated baring the truth about her and Oz like that, but, given that she had very few records, nothing that would really stand up to scrutiny, they had had to come clean.</p><p>Most of the other physicists weren’t ready to believe that she came from another world and the monkey was the physical manifestation of her soul, but that was okay. She wasn’t sure that she wanted them to believe that anyway. It was safer if they didn’t.</p><p>They had said though, that they didn’t want Oz to hide anymore, that they wanted to see him out and about, to check on how he was doing, to see him in her labs. They had seemed very sincere about this but the paranoid side of Marisa said they just wanted more of an opportunity to get Oz alone so they could hurt him. Hurt them.</p><p>She guessed she would have to see how things went.</p><p>One thing was for certain (and she wasn’t very happy about this), Oz was going to be allowed to help out in Mary’s lectures, <em> and </em> to be able to spend time with his undergraduate ‘friends’. Marisa didn’t trust them at all, but, given that everyone in that room, including Oz, had been adamant that Oz should be able to spend time with his ‘friends’, that it was ‘healthy’, Marisa had found herself forced to cave.</p><p>She would be watching them though. Very. Closely.</p><p>Mary stirred and let out a groan. Marisa smiled softly as her girlfriend blinked slowly and tried to focus on the world around her.</p><p>Marisa brushed a stray curl off of Mary’s forehead.</p><p>“Hmmm… I think my leg’s gone to sleep,” Mary stated, her words slurred with sleep. Then she gazed blearily at Marisa.</p><p>Marisa wondered if there could be anything more adorable than a half-asleep Mary and, even through the haze of negative emotions that had clouded the day, she found herself feeling grateful that this was her life, that she was here, with bleary-eyed Mary, in the bed that they shared, in the life that they shared together.</p><p>“Huh, Netflix is still playing,” Mary observed belatedly. Then, “Please take my tablet off of me, I don’t want to move to put it away.”</p><p>Marisa graced her with an affectionate eye-roll before doing as Mary had asked, taking the tablet off of her lap, and rolling over to put it on her own bedside table.</p><p>When she rolled back again Mary was staring at her sleepily, with so much affection Marisa thought she could burst.</p><p>Their lips met in the middle, but only for a second; they had had to twist their bodies awkwardly to avoid rolling on top of Oz, who was still dozing in between them, and Mary had lost her balance and rolled backwards.</p><p>They tried a second time. This time Marisa ended up with Mary’s flyaway hair in her mouth. She spluttered and Mary giggled quietly, before Marisa joined in.</p><p>“I think,” Marisa stated. “We should probably save the kissing for another day.”</p><p>“I agree,” Mary replied, her face was going red and she was clearly trying not to burst into laughter and wake Oz.</p><p>“Goodnight, Dr Mary Malone.”</p><p>“Good - before I say goodnight,” Mary interrupted herself, suddenly serious again. “How are you doing?”</p><p>“Surprisingly well,” Marisa said.</p><p>She was shocked to learn that she was speaking the truth.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>The monkey sat on the desk at the front of the lecture hall, surveying all of Mary’s students. Aled waived at him, he waved back happily.</p><p>Oz had responsibility, and he was revelling in it.</p><p>“Oz?” Mary asked, and he turned round to smile up at her. She handed him some sheets. “Could you distribute these around the class please?”</p><p>He nodded enthusiastically and gathered up the lecture handouts under one arm. They were slightly too big for him to carry comfortably, but he was more than up to the task, he had an important job to do.</p><p>He hopped down off the desk and scampered towards the tiered seating, before getting to work handing out the paper. Everyone smiled and said ‘thanks’. He loved that part. He loved the warm feeling of being valued and appreciated. When he reached his best friends (they were now sitting near the front again) Aled whispered to him, “picnic in the quad after the lecture?”. Oz nodded eagerly, then continued with his task.</p><p>After he was done with the handouts Mary pulled one of the movable whiteboards right down to the ground and asked him to write the next set of equations on it. He did so cheerfully, making sure to use lots of different colours and to make his writing nice and clear.</p><p>As he wrote he thought about his plans for the day; a picnic with his best friends, a lab with Marisa, and a dinner with his colleagues (it would be Dr Bradley’s birthday the next day). All in all, he thought it sounded like it would be very interesting.</p><p>He wasn’t bored anymore.</p><p>He wasn’t lonely.</p><p>He was valued.</p><p>And he was loved.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I hope you all enjoyed the longest one shot I have ever written!</p><p>Scenes that didn't quite fit:<br/>- Oz getting his own instagram account - monkey selfies! Having fun with his friends!<br/>- (idea courtesy of Rhaized) The students relinquishing Oz under a signed contract which states that Maryisa have to show him to them at least every week so they can make sure he's okay. </p><p>Anyways, it would make my day if you could leave a small comment :D</p><p>And, also, finally. HAPPY BIRTHDAY JASPER!!!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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